Dann’s Daily – Singapore’s First Pescetarian Cafe (with The Best Steamed Cakes in Town!)

I first knew about the term “pescetarian” when I met this lady during a food tasting session. I wanted to offer her some beef but she politely rejected and told me that she was on pescetarian diet.

“Pres… Presca…what?” The word “Pescetarian” is quite a mouthful to handle. She tried to explain the term to me but I was all too busy eating my steak and grew my own conclusions, “So it’s vegetarian lah!”

Of course, I was being ignorant.

Then, I came across the term while reading a food blog in US and realized that pescetarian diet is slighting different from vegetarian. While it shares many of its components with a vegetarian diet and includes vegetables, fruit, nuts, grains, beans, eggs, and dairy, but unlike a vegetarian diet, pescetarian also includes fish and shellfish.

And where can we get to try a pescetarian dish? Of course at Dann’s Daily!

The owner of Dann’s Daily, Chris, began doing PR and marcomm many years back. When she gave birth to her son (named Dann), she realised the little boy loves whole wheat bread, brown rice and alkaline water. So she researched on “pescetarian” diet and created many recipes to plan her son’s diet. Gradually, this passion slowly snowballed into an idea and eventually, she set up a pescetarian cafe with her husband, Xing.
Many of our kids grow up overweight and malnourished from a diet of process foods. Inspired by Jamie Oliver’s Food Revolution Movement (click here to read about Food Revolution Singapore), Dann’s Daily uses fresh and natural ingredients using fuss-free cooking methods.

Nestled in the old neighbourhood of Bedok, the cafe started 2 years back. They did a menu revamp recently and introduced alot of new pescetarian dishes.

I started my dinner with a glass of Soy Chia Chia ($7). Very unique name indeed, it is actually made of soy and chia seeds, which are the richest plant source of Omega-3. Okay, this is my first time hearing about chia seeds. Apparently, it is very popular for weight loss because it reduces food craving.

So chia seeds are added in, they are very similar to almond seeds, some of them when mix with water turns into jelly and some remains crunchy. So one sip of this drink has a combination of texture, one soft and the other “pok-pok-pok” sound.

If you are wondering why is this drink brown instead of the usual white soya bean colour, it is because organic carob syrup has been added. Another new term! Basically, it tasted somewhat similar to soya sauce but it is NOT soya sauce. This versatile syrup is rich in calcium and contains less calories and 17 times less fat than chocolate! It can be used as bread dips or drink or dessert or even the sauce for noodles!

Amazing, isn’t it? One drink and I learn two new things. But well, I guess it is an acquired taste lah. You have to love the soya sauce taste combined with some soft jelly texture and “pok-pok-pok”chia seeds. It is complicated.

They also served Teecino (never hear before once again), which is a fabulous NO-CAF coffee alternative, made with roasted almond, dates and figs. Very unique!

Next up, Organic Quinoa / Millet / Black Rice Salad ($8). Quinoa, another health food, is not a common item in most kitchens today. It is an amino acid-rich (protein) seed that has a fluffy, creamy, slightly crunchy texture and a somewhat nutty flavor when cooked.

Cooked it with millet (which is gluten free, alkaline and packed with vitamins and minerals) and black rice (high in nutritional value, rich in iron and fibre), VERY HEALTHY.

Okay, I shan’t flood you with more nutritional facts I found. Let’s go for something more ordinary and supper yummy Otah Japanese Cucumber Sandwich ($5). There is premium otah with fish meat chunks. paired with japanese cucumber and organic whole wheat bread for a perfect marriage.

Fish lovers will enjoy a classic gingery Fish Soup ($10). With an additional $2, you can add in QQ noodles and choose to have your noodles dry or in the soup. We had ours in dry version and I like it very much as it was tossed with organic carob syrup.

Vegetarian Salad ($7) comes with pumpkin patty. No gluten is added, they used zucchini to hold the patty instead.

Whole grains give you energy to let you last longer in a day. That’s why Dann’s Daily’s tortillas came in the form of whole wheat! Toasted Wholewheat Tortilla Set A ($15) is wrapped with premium white fish and mushroom cheese, and served with a side salad and chips. It is crisp on the outside, moist on the inside.

Finally, let me introduce to you THE STAR of this cafe: STEAMED CUPCAKES (aka huat kueh)!

Chris is always an avid baker. Being in the marketing and PR line for so long, Chris always seek to do something creative in any thing she does. Even for the cafe, instead of baking normal cupcakes, she was inspired by her mother’s Huat Kueh and decided to come up with steamed cake instead.

Trust me, this is THE BEST STEAMED CAKES IN TOWN! They are made of real fresh ingredients and used only organic raw sugar and grapeseed oil used for quality, density and moisture.

The best selling steamed cake is none other than Gula Melaka ($3). No worries if you’re lactose intolerant as Chris uses soy milk, which is less fattening, along with organic raw sugar and unbleached flour. The natural sweetness comes from sweet boiled gula melaka. It is very very very moist and dense. The grated coconut and gula melaka on top of the cake makes a big difference to the taste!

There are other flavours such as Pandan Chocolate ($4) and Strawberry ($4). The Pandan Chocolate Steamed Cakes has no artificial colour nor pandan essence, made from fresh pandan leaves with chocolate cream. And the strawberry steam cake is made from fresh strawberries. It is egg-less! I love it! If you are lucky, you will get to try their gula strawberry cupcake!

Each dish and drink at Dann’s Daily is prepared with alkaline water, which helps to reduce acidity in our bodies. A very very healthy meal indeed. After all my carrot cake, bak chor mee and chicken rice, I guess it’s time for some health food yo!
To read more about little’s Dann’s Daily Quote, click here!

Dann’s Daily
Address: 20 Eastwood Road, #01-06 Eastwood Centre
Tel: +65 6449 1355
Operation Hours: Tuesdays to Sunday 10am – 8pm, closed on Mondays
Website: http://www.danndaily.com/Danns_Daily/Home.html